Mitchell Smith Secures District Title for Sandites in 39-34 Win over Ponca City
/After missing out the past two years, Sand Springs is headed back to Dual State thanks to straight toughness and senior leadership.
With one match left in the Sandites’ district dual against No. 11 Ponca City, Sand Springs trailed 34-33. It all came down to Mitchell Smith at 150 pounds.
With a knee injury that many would consider season-ending, the senior put his team on his shoulders and came out with a pin of Braden Perciful in 30 seconds to secure the 39-34 victory.
“We needed him big time,” said head coach Ty Bowling.
“I said, ‘Hey. The score is close enough. We don’t need anything big, we just need to go out and get a win.’ He goes out and finds a pin. That’s huge for us. Senior leadership.”
“We haven’t gone to dual state since my freshman year, so this is big,” said Smith. “We had some bad losses the past two years, to teams we all felt like we should have beat, so it’s nice to win like this.”
Sand Springs went on to win 46-27 against Edmond Deer Creek and 48-25 against No. 13 Union to clinch its 18th District Championship Tuesday evening at the UMAC.
“Straight toughness,” said Bowling. “We had a handful of injuries. It’s January, that’s what wrestling is. We’ve got guys with bad ankles, bad knees, so they dug deep, a lot of toughness. They battled. They showed that they wanted it.”
“We’ve been looking toward these duals all season. We knew Ponca City was the defending champ, we know what they had coming back. We knew it was going to take all 14 doing their job, whether it was finding bonus, not giving up bonus, or just going out and just gritting out a win.”
Four Sandites went undefeated at the quad, including Jaxon “Scout” Trotter, who had to start each dual at 157 pounds.
“We usually start at 106 and we started all three duals at 157,” said Bowling. “He had three tough matches and came away with three wins, so he started us off right every time.”
Freshman Hudson Sheppard and junior Mason Harris also went undefeated, winning all three of their matches by fall.
“I’m just excited,” said Harris. “It’s my first time and I just want to know what it’s like. I was one year off from knowing what it’s like so I’m just excited to bring Sand Springs back into it.”
“We have a few injuries right now that are still healing up. By the time those heal back up we’re going to be even more dominant than we are now.”
Smith won both of his matches as well. With a 46-21 lead against Deer Creek, the Sandites forfeited Smith’s weight, but the senior insisted on wrestling against Union, where he collected a 31-second pin.
“I really wanted to,” said Smith. “I wanted to wrestle the second match as well, but my coach told me not to because he didn’t want to risk it, which is fair but I’m not a big fan of sitting on the bench and watching my teammates wrestle, so I tried to get some matches in as well.”
The Sandites still have a few tough duals left before Dual State, and will host No. 4 Broken Arrow (8-1) Tuesday for Homecoming and No. 2 Stillwater (10-1) on Thursday.
The varsity boys took the weekend off but the varsity girls and junior varsity boys competed at the Morey Villareal Memorial tournament at Will Rogers High School.
The JV boys won the tournament against a field of mostly varsity competitors, topping Bartlesville 207 to 194.5.
Dawson Briscoe won the 106-pound bracket with five pins, Brody Ensten won at 157 with two pins, and Peyton Callis won at 165 with four pins.
Colt Hood, Landen Horton, and Christopher Cooper were runners-up and Jackson Burdge, Preston Reyna, Brock O’Dell, Dallas Flores, and Cash Lucas took third place.
Madison Chambers took first place, Gracie Young was second, and Kreedence Behnke was third to lead the girls varsity to a fifth-place finish.
Youth
Gage Fadenrecht, Ryker Dawes, Collin Randall, Brackton Upton, Hunter Sims, Kase Skaggs, and Jace Simms all won their brackets at the Broken Arrow Wrestlemania tournament, representing the Keystone Kids.
